Writing is work and cooking is relaxing.
Catering is extremely demanding financially and physically. It's a business.
The main thing I look for in a recipe is taste, which is different from caterers and restaurants, who first ask 'How does it look?'
When I make a recipe for the first time and it's fabulous, I know I'm in trouble because I don't know exactly what I did, and I can't replicate it.
After I outlined 'Catering to Nobody,' I went and worked for a caterer. And the other thing I had to do was to talk to the Jefferson County Sheriff's Department about how they investigated a crime.
The thing is, if you make best-sellerdom your goal, you're going to be in trouble. It's a very nice thing to have happen, but if one makes that a goal like, say, a literary writer has the goal of getting the Pulitzer Prize, that's so unpredictable.
What one's goal should be is just to become a better writer and to tell different kinds of stories.